Chapter 1: In the Hidden Mist

Darkness.

Then pain.

And finally, a cry - his cry.

'What is happening? Confusion invaded his mind as he was torn from the darkness. 'A moment ago I was in my apartment studying for the medical exam and now...'

Blinding lights. Excited voices. Hands moving him.

"It's a boy!" A female voice announced in an unknown language.

'He looks...Asian??? But I was in...' The thought was interrupted by a new wave of sensation. His body - so small, so weak - was wrapped in something soft.

"Congratulations, Mizutani-san." The same voice as before. "A healthy, strong child."

Through the blurred vision of newborn eyes, he could make out the face of a woman with delicate features but marked by fatigue. Her blue eyes stared at him adoringly as she held him to her chest.

"Ren," she whispered. "Our little Ren."

'Ren? Who is Ren? His adult mind struggled to comprehend the situation. 'Am I dreaming?

A man approached the bed. His eyes were kind but watchful, like those of someone used to constantly looking over his shoulder. But it was what he wore on his forehead that chilled the blood in his new, tiny veins.

A metal forehead protector. With an engraved symbol.

'Those wavy lines-no, that's not possible.'

Four stylized lines that resembled waves. A symbol he had seen hundreds of times, but only in...

'Kirigakure. The Village of Hidden Mist.'

Panic threatened to overwhelm his adult mind trapped in an infant's body. Of all the possible places to reincarnate, he had ended up in one of the deadliest in Naruto's world.

Through the fogged-up window of the delivery room, he could glimpse a thick fog that shrouded everything like a shroud. A fog that hid secrets and blood, betrayal and death.

"What a beautiful newborn," murmured one of the attendants. "His eyes ... they look so ..."

"Aware," completed another, with astonishment in her voice.

His father - for that was to be his father in this new life - stiffened imperceptibly. His mother clutched him a little tighter to her chest, as if to protect him.

'I don't understand what is happening,' he thought with growing urgency. 'If it's a dream I'll wake up soon...I think?'

He didn't know what had happened, but he knew all too well about those front covers. The Kirigakure of the Bloody Mist. The place where academy students were forced to kill each other. The village that had conducted a systematic purge of kekkei genkai holders.

'It's very quiet for a newborn,' someone in the room commented.

'I need to settle down,' he thought as he pretended to fall asleep, 'until I figure out what happened.'

As sleep really began to claim his childlike body, one last thought crossed his mind: 'I hope to wake up from this dream as soon as possible.'The fog outside the window seemed to thicken, as if to hide from the outside world the dark thoughts of an infant all too aware of the fate that awaited him.

[ Hi there, this is my first post, if you can leave some powerstone, it helps me to grow and improve the quality]